 The Emily Couric Cancer Center will get an empty shell of a fifth floor in order to have room to grow |
The UVA Board of Visitors (BOV) approved a plan to add a fifth floor to the Emily C. Couric Clinical Cancer Center at a cost of $8 million. The project, originally approved in September 2004 as a five-floor plan, was reduced to a four-floor plan in July 2006 because of a reduced budget. The new plan for the Cancer Center, approved at the June 8 meeting, brings the total project budget to $74 million. This price tag will be funded from $40.3 million in debt, $25 million in state general funds and $8.7 million in gifts.
The location of the building site, surrounded by Lee Street, Jefferson Park Avenue and railroad tracks, has left little room for future expansion at ground level. According to Dr. Peyton T. Taylor, Jr., medical director of the UVA Cancer Center, the fifth floor will be left unfinished when the building opens to house future expansion.
“It is much more practical and economical to shell in the space now than try to add a floor later when the building is occupied by patients and staff and sensitive equipment,” stated Taylor in an e-mail.
The fifth-floor addition will not change original plans for some of the building’s environmental design elements, according to Luis A. Carrazana, senior facility planner for research and clinical programs. A terrace with a garden above the fifth floor will accompany what Carrazana calls an “iconic” v-shaped roof designed to channel rainwater. The building will also feature ample windows to let more natural light into patient rooms.
“It [The roof] does give it this uplifting type of image and feature what we’re trying to achieve,” says Carrazana. “It’s about hope and survival.”
Many of these design elements are part of the University’s plan for the building to achieve Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification, for its “green” qualities. The Cancer Center is designed to receive LEED Silver accreditation, one of the higher rankings.
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